Kangaroo Court

Though the term is now familiarly used to stipulate any illegal trial or sham legal proceeding, during the British colonization of Australia the phrase was used to disparage marsupials when they attempted to form an independent judicial system; the British often mocked their naïve idealism, poor penmanship, and tiny powdered wigs. Kangaroos were used as a catch-all term because even Koalas, Wombats, and Bandicoots had to admit that kangaroos were pretty dumb.